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California’s housing shortage is nowhere as big as you think. In an age where statistics can be weaponized, pro-development types will toss out the biggest shortfall guestimate they can find to make their point: Only more construction will prune California’s high cost-of-living. Conversely, those who prefer slower growth will quote more modest shortage estimates — […]

If California is serious about fixing its housing challenges, it should wean its cities off the sales tax gravy train. Until local municipalities are properly motivated to build, not much will change. And the only persuasion that makes cities jump is cash. Currently, cities are addicted to boosting sales tax collection because it’s about the […]

Southern California’s best year for housing creation since the Great Recession left the region trailing the national growth pace and a local hiring spree. Fresh Census Bureau statistics detail the slow pace of new housing added to the region. The number of housing units — owned or rented — in the four counties covered by […]

One of the most persistent ideas of Democratic politics in California — the push for single-payer health insurance — is favored by only 41 percent of voters statewide, while 46 percent would not swap their private insurance for a government-backed system, according to a poll released Wednesday, Feb. 6 by Quinnipiac University. That result comes […]

California again had more outs than ins via major moving companies last year, but that gap shrank 21 percent as departures fell faster than arrivals. My trusty spreadsheet — filled with annual state-by-state migration stats from United, Allied and Atlas van lines — shows a continuation of the long-running decline in people moving, in or […]

California’s housing market ended 2018 on a down note, with sales for 2018 as a whole down for the first time in four years and home price gains showing signs of leveling off, Realtor economists reported Thursday, Jan. 17. A volatile stock market and political and economic uncertainty contributed to the market slowdown, according to […]

In the past bust, it was the fast-growing exurbs, aspirational home of the middle and working classes, that imploded, driving millions of people into foreclosure. Aided by dicey lending practices from the private sector, devastation was most precipitous in states such as California where public policy helped drive to unsustainable levels. This time the biggest […]

Macron’s policies rest on the notion on-going climate catastrophe embraced by media, the academy and the intelligentsia. Every time weather takes a nasty turn as it often does — heat waves, downpours, forest fires, floods — it’s often attributed to climate change. This leads to the notion that we need to embrace climate “hysteria,” as […]

California officially became the first state in the nation on Wednesday, Dec. 5 to require homes built in 2020 and later be solar powered. . . . While nobody spoke Wednesday in opposition to the new provisions, the commission received more than 300 letters from around the state opposing the solar mandate because of the […]

Ultimately the gig economy, even as it uses the latest technology, represents something of a devolution of labor. Although widely associated as “progressive,” the arbiters of the gig economy are, perhaps unconsciously, recreating the conditions that led to the impoverishment of the peasants and mechanics — replaced by slaves — at the end of the […]

Our analysis? California is in danger of pricing itself out for moderate wage earners, and particularly families. Taxes, poor educational performance, congestion and signs of slowing growth are no doubt contributing factors. But the big enchilada in California — by far the largest source of distortion in living costs — is housing. Over 90 percent […]

A bill that would penalize retailers that hire trucking companies which have legal judgments against them for labor law violations is now a signature away becoming law after it was passed by the California legislature on Friday, Aug. 31. Senate Bill 1402, authored by state Sen. Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens), was passed by a majority […]

If there’s an award for environmental virtue signaling, California would win the prize. Yet for all the constant self-promotion, shameless grandstanding and endless moralizing, perhaps it’s time to reconsider the impact, and failures, of our current green obsessions. Take the recent fires that Gov. Jerry Brown, predictably and with little evidence, blamed squarely on climate […]

A quick bit of background: On July 6, the temperature hit 108 degrees in Los Angeles. A day later it hit 104 degrees, roughly 20 degrees hotter than normal. The scalding temperatures led to record electricity demand forcing the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power to ask customers to voluntarily cut their electricity use. […]

Under these conditions, California cannot create a successful multi-cultural society. As environmentalist Michael Shellenberger has noted, the way the state applies its “green policies” has transformed California from “the most progressive state” to “the most racist.” Recently, a coalition of hundreds of veteran civil rights leaders sued CARB over selecting greenhouse gas reduction measures that […]